


Hours Speed by Like Seconds (What Happens is Iconic)

by Anonymous_Authors_Incorporated



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Schönberg/Boublil, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Adoption, F/F, Fluff, Rule 63, Songfic, Ugh, Underage Drinking, Useless Lesbians, idk man its just lesbians, idk stupidity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:14:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28240728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anonymous_Authors_Incorporated/pseuds/Anonymous_Authors_Incorporated
Summary: Enjolras had been staring at her phone on the counter all morning. When each Courfeyrac and Combeferre mentioned it as they walked past it, she ignored them.When it did begin to buzz, she startled so aggressively she nearly fell off the chair she was perched on, before pulling it towards her and taking a deep breath.She looked at the caller ID.Dionysus Eluethereus,it read.Dionysus the deliverer of men from sorrow.Right then, she wished she’d picked a more apt epithet. Perhaps Omadios, the flesh-eater, or Enualios, war-like. She steeled herself to be yelled at and answeredALittle Miss Perfectsongfic.
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	Hours Speed by Like Seconds (What Happens is Iconic)

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot believe I am here in the year of our dark lord the antichrist 2020 writing a songfic. I'm sorry. Lesbians begged to be written. I am but a slave to the whims of ADHD. Enjoy.
> 
> Oh, if you don't know the song Little Miss Perfect... go listen to it.

Enjolras smiled out at the crowded venue, taking off her signature leather jacket and tossing it to Jehan off stage. _Thank you,_ she mouthed at them.

“Hey y’all, how’re you doin’ tonight?” The crowd cheered in response, and she laughed. “I’ll take that to mean you’re doing pretty well! I’ve got a bit of a treat for you tonight—I’m gonna debut a new song, right here, right now for you all!”

The replying cheers were overwhelmingly loud. Enjolras sat down on the stool in front of the mic stand.

“Now, this song is a little different than the rest of our music, and Athena” she gestured at Combeferre, and he waved, looking up from switching his electric bass out, “and Aphrodite,” she paused, letting Courfeyrac make some noise on his drum kit, “encouraged me to write it at all.”

Combeferre came up behind her and spoke into her mic. “Apollo, you know as well as I do that the revolution needs sweet love songs as much as it needs fiery passion.” He kissed her cheek and she stuck her tongue out at him.

The crowd made a noise somewhere between a laugh and an awe. She turned back to telling her story.

“So this song is about the first girl I ever loved. She’s the one who named me Apollo, you know. I suppose we’ll call her Dionysus, because I don’t want to risk her personal privacy, and I know you’ll ask.”

“What matters for you to know about her is that she was always wilder than me, and was the first person who told me that I should leave my hair be, because when I was young, I straightened my hair obsessively to match my darling sister’s. So without further ado…” She nodded at Joly at the keyboard, and he began to play. She tucked a curl that had escaped her ponytail behind her ear.

* * *

Enjolras took a deep breath, steadying herself. She looked her reflection in the eye, composed in her bathroom mirror.

“You can do this, Jeanne. First day of classes at a new school is nothing.” She nodded and stepped away from the mirror.

* * *

“Straight hair, straight A's, straight forward, straight path, I don't cut corners, I make a point to be on time; head of the student council!”

Enjolras sang into the mic, thinking of the girl she’d been in highschool. She smiled, faintly, wishing that she could give her fourteen year old self a hug. She’d needed it.

* * *

Enjolras leaned against the wall of her friend’s living room, and sipped from her cup. She tried not to make a face at the taste of the drink. She did not like tequila, she decided. Her friend emerged from the kitchen, and took her by the elbow.

“Come on, Jeanne! You _have_ to meet Pierre. He’s super into that philosophy shit. You like politics, right? You’ll have something to talk about.”

* * *

Enjolras thought of the party she’d met Combeferre at. They had had a lot to talk about, but if her friend had thought that would be enough of a set up to get them to date, she’d been very very wrong. Combeferre was as gay as the day was long.

“I don't black out at parties, I jam to Paul McCartney, if you ask me how I'm doing I'll say… ‘Well, hmm’” She took a deep breath, preparing for the shift in tone.

* * *

“Jeanne!” Cosette sobbed, trying to pull away from the strange man who was taking her away to a foster home. Enjolras squirmed and kicked at the woman holding onto her.

“You can’t take Cosette away from me! She’s my sister! Let me go!” She screamed.

Six months later, her adoptive parents came to pick her up from daycare with secret smiles on their faces, and Enjolras had cried and not let go of Cosette for hours after they got home. It wasn’t until many years later that they found out that the adoption agency hadn’t told them that Enjolras had a twin. It had taken them those six months to track down and adopt Cosette, too.

From then on they had gotten the best of everything their parents could provide. The best schools, the best tutors when they needed help, whatever after school activities they wanted. They were loved.

* * *

“I was adopted when I was two, my parents spoiled me rotten. Often I ask myself, ‘What did I do to get as far as I've gotten?’” She smiles out at the audience.

“A pretty girl walks by my locker, my heart gives a flutter but I don't dare utter a word 'cause that would be absurd behaviour for little miss perfect!”

* * *

It had been junior year when Grantaire had transferred into her school, and the first time Enjolras saw her she knew she could never _ever_ be allowed to be alone with her. Grantaire was everything Enjolras wasn’t—artistic, messy, loud, contrary. She was brilliant, but she chose to sit and doodle her way through classes, to argue with the teacher, and to never apply herself to her schoolwork—and Enjolras was enraptured. She was beautiful. She was impossible. And Enjolras had to stay as far away from her as possible.

* * *

“Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na. No, I can't risk falling off my throne! La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la-love is something I don't even know—”

Enjolras looked out at the audience, wishing for a flash of green eyes, for a dark mass of curls attached to one of the most brilliant people she’d ever met. Had Grantaire ever gotten the undercut she’d always been saying she would?

“Straight hair, straight A's, straight forward, straight girl; little miss perfect—that's me!”

Enjolras let her mind drift to the night she’d fucked everything up.

* * *

Jeanne leaned against the side of her bed, laughing at Courfeyrac’s antics. They were seniors, all of them, or they had been until just a few days prior. Now Courfeyrac was the only one of them without a diploma yet, as his graduation was the next weekend. Combeferre and Enjolras had met Courfeyrac on the debate circuit, and had hit it off instantly, despite being from rival schools and on opposite sides of the debate. The three of them were going to the same university, and Grantaire, who had managed to make herself a place in their little group, despite Enjolras’s misgivings and sometimes cactus-like nature, would be going to a different university in the same city. They were celebrating. Grantaire was warm at Enjolras’s shoulder.

* * *

“One night my friend stayed over. We laughed, and drank and ordered—something about her drew me in. What? It's totally platonic!”

Enjolras almost laughed at herself a little on stage. The audience was watching her, rapt, not moving and hardly seeming to breathe. If only she’d known then what she knew now, maybe she wouldn’t have let Grantaire go so easily.

* * *

The half empty bottle of wine was sat precariously between Courfeyrac and Enjolras, both gesticulating madly while they discussed the socio-political implications of… something. Honestly, the details were a little blurry. Combeferre fiddled with the empty bottle and spoke more quietly with Grantaire, and they both paused to smile at their friends.

“Careful, Apollo,” Grantaire had smirked drolly. “You’ll stain your virgin-white carpet if you don’t mind the bottle.”

Enjolras, now distracted from her comment about marxism, pouted slightly. “I didn’t pick the carpet, it’s not my fault it’s white.” She took a sip from the bottle before passing it to Grantaire, feeling the cynical girl’s warm hands as they exchanged the bottle.

* * *

Enjolras bit her lip gently. She could almost smell the wine, even now.

“That night was so exciting, her smirks were so enticing. Hours speed by like seconds, then—what happens is iconic—she takes a sip, I bite my lip. She tells a joke, I nearly choke. She braids my hair, I sit there, blacking out for the first time,”

* * *

Grantaire had been so close to her, and it had been so easy, with her (somehow) deft hands in her hair, to just. Lean in. She was warm, and soft, and tasted like cherry chapstick and red wine, and—

Enjolras panicked. It had been nothing, just Courfeyrac putting his hands to his mouth in joy and surprise, and yet… Enjolras ran like a startled deer.

* * *

Enjolras looked down towards the ground briefly, and shrugged slightly.

“Next thing I know I lose control. I finally kiss her but oh no!”

She braced for Joly’s sharp staccatos, and let her voice get a little rough, a little angry. A bit more towards what she usually sounded like on stage, singing about revolution and the future.

“I see a face in my window. Then my brain starts to go, ‘Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na. No, you can't risk falling off your throne! La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la-love is something you don't even know! Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na—you can't risk falling off your throne! La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la-love!”

She took a deep breath, stealing herself for the worst part of the story—her own cruel lies. At least she could own up to them now.

“You don't even know. Rewind, induce amnesia. Deny the truth—it's easier. You're just confused, believe her when she says there's nothing there… It's never worth it… When you're little miss perfect.”

She let Joly’s soft piano fade out before smiling out at the audience, and standing up. After a moment, they began to cheer wildly. She laughed, relieved, over her shoulder towards Combeferre, who rolled his eyes and mouthed “I told you so!” around a smile.

“Thank you all so much! And now, a song I think a few of you may quite like,” she grins wildly.

Combeferre started the dramatic bass riff opening to _Future Havens, Burned Harbors,_ and she sank back into her show routine.

* * *

Courfeyrac slugged her shoulder as they walked off after their encore. “Told you they’d love it, Enj. I’m sure it’ll be on youtube soon enough, I saw a _lot_ of phones held up.”

Enjolras shrugged. “There’ll be a recording on our youtube in about twenty four hours. I asked Bahorel very nicely if he and Feuilly would go and record two angles in high definition so we can get a proper live recording of it up.”

Joly smiled. “Jehan was filming, too, so there’ll be cool side views too! But Enjolras… What are you going to do when Grantaire sees it?”

* * *

When Enjolras woke up on Courfeyrac’s couch in the morning with a splitting headache, it took her a brief moment to put all the pieces together. She had kissed Grantaire. _She had kissed Grantaire._

_Shit._

Courfeyrac came in about fifteen minutes later, and brought her a glass of water, a mug of coffee, two ibuprofen, and an ironclad alibi.

“So…” he had said, after letting her drink the water, take the pills, and start on the coffee. “How much of last night do you remember?”

Enjolras had paused, realized her salvation, and lied. “Not much past the pizza we ordered after the first bottle arriving. Why, exactly, am I on your couch instead of in my own bed?”

* * *

Enjolras shrugged sadly. “Apologise, I suspect. A lot. For a long time. And then hope we can be friends again.”

Combeferre bumped her with his shoulder comfortingly. “Chin up, Enj. The hard part is over.”

She sincerely doubted that, but honey sweetened lies have always been easier to ignore and swallow than ones not meant to comfort.

* * *

Grantaire, for all her flaws, refused to let herself use twitter more than once a day. Given that she’d more than used her daily allotment of demon bird app to tweet a photo of the latte art she’d made, and then even overdone it by allowing herself to tweet a photo of some chalk art she did in the square later, she was staunchly _not_ checking twitter when Enjolras was performing.

So it was quite a shock to her, the next day, to see the hashtags _#WhoIsDionysus, #ApolloAndDionysus,_ and _#LittleMissPerfect_ trending, and her feed simply filled with talk of _barricade boys_ and therefore Enjolras.

Grantaire squinted down at her phone for a few minutes, then took a screenshot of the trending hashtags and sent it to Courfeyrac with a very simple message.

_11:38 R: [image] what the fuck did she do this time?_

Two minutes later she got a call from Combeferre.

“Grantaire, you haven’t, by any chance, gone and watched any of the videos from last night of her new song, have you?”

Grantaire answered him slowly and nervously. “New song?”

Combeferre was silent for a moment, then he exhaled all at once. “I’ll send you a link. Please don’t commit murder?”

Combeferre hung up, and Grantaire felt very, very scared. Clearly, this had something to do with her, then.

* * *

_“Hey y’all, how’re you doin’ tonight?”_ Enjolras smiled out towards the audience of the mediocre and slightly shaky phone camera shot. She was wearing her signature blood red tank top, cut just low enough to tease at the hint of tattoos she never shared with the public, and ripped, black skinny jeans.

The crowd cheered in response, and Enjolras laughed, joyful and carefree. _“I’ll take that to mean you’re doing pretty well! I’ve got a bit of a treat for you tonight—I’m gonna debut a new song, right here, right now for you all!”_

Enjolras, despite the shoddy camera work, was radiant. She sat down, introduced the song, and started to sing.

* * *

From the moment Grantaire had seen Enjolras (walking into the school with Cosette, their long, blonde hair in matching braids) she had known she had to get to know her. Her upright, candid nature charmed, her intellect dizzied, and she was full of unyielding passion. How could Grantaire, a simple, cynical, young lesbian, resist?

* * *

_This,_ Grantaire thought to herself when the video ended, _is cruelty from Enjolras I have done nothing to earn._

She tried to feel angry, to want to yell, but all she could feel was her heart, rent in two. Enjolras had known. She had remembered. _She had lied._

A year of rejection, followed by four years of pining, of being in Enjolras’s orbit, and all along, she had remembered.

Headless of the tears clouding her vision and falling down her cheeks, Grantaire opened her contacts and selected “Apollo”.

* * *

Enjolras had been staring at her phone on the counter all morning. When each Courfeyrac and Combeferre mentioned it as they walked past it, she ignored them.

When it did begin to buzz, she startled so aggressively she nearly fell off the chair she was perched on, before pulling it towards her and taking a deep breath.

She looked at the caller ID. _Dionysus Eluethereus,_ it read. _Dionysus the deliverer of men from sorrow._ Right then, she wished she’d picked a more apt epithet. Perhaps Omadios, the flesh-eater, or Enualios, war-like. She steeled herself to be yelled at and answered.

“Yes?” She said hesitantly.

_Sniffling._

Grantaire was crying.

Enjolras had not even considered Grantaire crying a possibility. She panicked.

“Grantaire?”

She spoke quietly, sounding choked with tears. “Why? Why did you lie to me? For five years, you lied to me. You could have just told me!”

Enjolras blinked rapidly. “You-you said it meant nothing to you. I was—I thought…” She took a deep breath. “I wanted it to mean something. I thought that since you clearly didn’t, it would be easier.”

Grantaire let out a choked sob, seemed to begin to speak, and then hung up.

A moment later, Combeferre’s phone rang, and he stood from where he had been drinking his tea for maybe five minutes, and walked to the door of the apartment. He leaned on the wall next to the door in the hallway.

* * *

“Combeferre,” Grantaire sobbed. “I’ve spent the last six years in love with her, she doesn’t get to do this to me, it’s not fair!”

He frowned. “Did you tell her that?”

_“No!_ God no, of course not.” _Sniffling._ “It's not fair…” Grantaire whispered.

Combeferre took a deep breath. “Okay, on Bahorel’s behalf, I am going to tell you to pull yourself together and go to the gym. When you get back at four thirty, I am going to give you half an hour to make yourself presentable, and then I am going to bring Enjolras over, and the two of you are going to talk this out. If I have to bring out the old chess debate clock again to keep you from screaming at each other, so help me god, I’ll do it.”

_Silence._

“Fine.”

“We love you, R. I promise, if she does anything else stupid or tells you any more lies I will make her click the shock pen and replace all her note taking pens with dying and dead ones for the next two weeks.”

Grantaire laughed, a weak and watery sound. “Love you too.”

* * *

Grantaire did, to her scheming friend’s benefit, feel much better after punching some things. When she answered the door to her flat to let Combeferre and Enjolras in, she’d been out of the shower for maybe fifteen minutes, just long enough to throw on a sports bra and a pair of sweatpants, and throw her uncooperative hair up into a ponytail, showing off the undercut Bahorel had just touched up for her a few days ago.

If she’d been paying even a modicum of attention to Enjolras, she would have noticed the way the blonde’s eyes had widened at said undercut, before getting caught on her exposed abs.

_Shit,_ Enjolras had thought. _She could break me in half, easy._

(She definitely thought it was hot.)

They sat down, Combeferre and Grantaire on the artist’s comfortable couch, Enjolras in the armchair. Combeferre looked at them both.

“I do not want to have to do this for you, please for the love of god do not make me moderate.”

Grantaire pulled her knees up to her chest, an odd gesture for someone so strong. “Talk.”

Enjolras licked her lips, and took a deep breath, then paused, and tried again.

“Grantaire… I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have written a song about you, and I definitely shouldn’t have played it without asking you first. You’re—well—you were my friend, and as… tense as our relationship has been, for the last year or so—”

Grantaire scoffs. “We’ve barely spoken for the past year, because we spent the three years before that screaming at each other. But sure, tense.”

Enjolras closed her eyes, her brow furrowed in pain, but went on. “I shouldn’t have lied to you because I was insecure, I shouldn’t have played the song in public without asking, and I probably shouldn’t have kissed you, since it seems like that’s what fucked everything up.”

Combeferre sighed and handed Enjolras the shock pen. She clicked it, as a nervous habit, and jumped at the shock. She glared at Combeferre, who just raised an eyebrow.

Grantaire hid her face in her knees. “You have no idea, huh.” She laughed darkly. “I’ve been trotting at your heels like a lost puppy, desperately in love with you, for seven years, and you had no idea? You win, Enjolras.”

She stood and went into her room, not even having the energy to slam her door. She closed it softly, and sank down with her back to it, feeling tears run down her face.

She faintly registered soft voices, then the door to her apartment opening and closing, before someone made their way to the door.

“Ferre, whatever you had planned didn’t work. Leave me to drink myself to sleep in peace.”

There was a sigh, and someone sat down on the other side of the door.

“I sent Ferre away on the condition I wouldn’t let you drink yourself to an early grave.”

She cursed.

“Haven’t you caused me enough pain for one twenty four hour period?”

Enjolras’s head thunked against the door.

“I’m not going to leave until we’re friends again. I’m sorry for hurting you. I’m sorry for fucking everything up by being scared of myself, and of you. You were one of my best friends, Grantaire. I want that back. I miss you.”

Grantaire closed her eyes, and willed herself not to respond.

Enjolras didn’t wait for very long before continuing. 

“I think… I thought that being queer was something to hide and to hide from. I needed to be perfect, it would have been an imperfection. I couldn’t bear to let my parents down, you know? Turns out that’s just an anxiety disorder, who’d have thought. It was stupid of me, though. To ever consider you that way. Not just cruel and unfair, but wrong.

“I think I was so uncomfortable with my own queerness that I intentionally refused to acknowledge how wonderful you were. You were loyal to me, always there when I needed you, and so strong, even then, before you started boxing. A brilliant artist, whip smart, and completely thrilling. Everything I wasn’t supposed to want, all wrapped up in the most gorgeous package I’d ever seen.

“You still are, for the record. The most gorgeous person I’ve ever seen. I still can’t get you out of my head. I loved arguing with you, because you held your ground, cited sources, and forced me into defensible, actionable positions. You kept me safe at protests and rallies—you’re not a very subtle body guard, it turns out. Either that or Courfeyrac’s got a knack with a camera. He showed me photos, dozens of them, of you keeping us safe. Punching nazis, putting yourself between the rest of us and the cops so we could get away. I must be stupid to never have noticed.

“I guess… I’ve been enamoured with you for as long as I’ve known you. You’re a woman of contradictions, and I… I love it. I love you. And I’m sorry for fucking it all up by kissing you drunk after graduation and lying about it.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes, before Enjolras sighed, and seemed to give in. “I guess… It's fair to not want to talk to me. I’ll call Jehan so you don’t end up needing to get your stomach pumped.” She stood, and walked away from the door. Grantaire heard a quiet phone call. She didn’t try to make out what Enjolras was saying. She was in shock.

Eventually, she heard Jehan arrive, say a few quiet words to Enjolras, and then her front door opened and closed again. Jehan knocked gently on the door to her bedroom.

“She said she loves me,” Grantaire said in shock.

Jehan’s sad smile was practically audible in their words. “Do you believe her?”

Grantaire stood up and opened the door to see Jehan face to face. “She told me she loves me,” Grantaire repeated, dazed. “Then she left.”

Jehan nodded slowly. Grantaire snapped to, a look of horror crossing her face. “I let her leave!”

Jehan tugged her through the door, pushed her keys into her hand, and nudged her out the front door.

“She doesn’t have a car, she’s walking. I’ll make myself scarce.”

Grantaire sprinted down the route towards Enjolras’s apartment, and caught her about halfway there.

“Enjolras!” She said. Enjolras visibly flinched, and turned, nervous.

Grantaire grinned, dazed and bright. “You love me.”

Enjolras nodded slowly.

“You love me, so you should kiss me.” Grantaire said.

Enjolras just stared.

“What.” She croaked.

Grantaire reached towards her, gently and slowly, and caressed her cheek. “I’ve been in love with you for seven years, and we have wasted the last five of them not kissing. I would very much like that to be remedied. Also for you to be my girlfriend.”

Enjolras blinked at her slowly, and touched the hand on her cheek. She began to smile. “Girlfriend?”

Grantaire nodded bashfully.

Enjolras drew herself up to her full height, so they were on the same level, and moved towards Grantaire, pausing a hair's breadth from her lips. “Would you permit me?”

Grantaire’s smile tasted sweet, like vanilla lip balm, and not at all like red wine.


End file.
